In his pedestrian review of Le Bouchon Breton’s new sibling at Spitalfields, The Independent’s Terry Durack begins with the observation that “an honest waiter is hard to find”. This ostensibly explains why he was both surprised and impressed by the candour of François Bertrand, the brasserie’s restaurant manager:

Tell him you are dithering between the steak frites and the moules frites, and he will tell you the steak frites is good, but no better or worse than any other steak frites around town. The moules, on the other hand, he says, are done better at only one or two other places.

It’s odd that Durack would single out Bertrand as that rarity, an honest waiter, when he identifies Bertrand as the restaurant manager. And even if, as Durack might argue, Bertrand was assuming the responsibilities and posture of an honest head waiter, he might have been doing so only because he recognized the critic and thought it advisable to take charge of his table and do whatever was necessary to prevent him from ordering and ultimately slamming the mediocre steak frites. [Read more...]